Community Outreach and Food Pantry

The mission of the Hour Children Food Pantry is to address hunger and health related issues affecting low-income families.

Overview

Through our client-choice, supermarket-style food pantry, we strive to provide healthy food in a safe and welcoming environment. Open to both Hour Children families and the local community, the pantry works to provide nutritious items, such as fresh vegetables and fruits, meats and fish, beans, milk, and whole grains as often as possible. Clients are free to choose the items from each food group that best fit their taste, dietary, and cultural preferences. As one of our pantry clients said, “There is dignity in choice!”

Alyssa, our Food Pantry and Outreach Coordinator, works with a dedicated group of about 20 volunteers that come weekly to help ensure that each distribution runs as smoothly as possible. Through educational workshops such as cooking demonstrations, and partnerships with organizations such as the Food Bank and VNSNY, we seek to provide resources beyond food that connect neighborhood residents to additional resources that are necessary to sustain healthy lives.

Community Outreach

Hour Children Food Pantry hosts the Long Island City CSA. The CSA provides opportunities for local farmers to deliver directly to customers in urban areas. Any farm-fresh fruits and vegetables leftover from the CSA are donated directly to the pantry to be given to pantry clients.

With support from Just Food and United Way, the pantry serves as a Local Produce Link site, connecting local farmers to pantries operating in underserved NYC neighborhoods. As a result, hundreds of pounds of fresh, organic vegetables are distributed to our clients each summer and fall.

The pantry hosts monthly cooking demonstrations from organizations including Just Food, Food Bank of NYC, and City Harvest.

The pantry is located inside a gated parking lot on 11th Street between 36th and 37th Avenues. Use the pedestrian entrance to access the lot and look for the green awning that says “Hour Children.”

We have recently renovated the pantry to provide new refrigeration and additional shelves. The redesign also provides more room for shoppers and volunteers.

The pantry is accessible by bus and subway. For subway service, take the F train to 21st Street – Queensbridge at 41st Avenue. For bus service, take the Q66 to 35th Avenue, the Q69 to 36th Avenue, the Q102 to Vernon Boulevard/36th Avenue, the Q103 to Vernon Boulevard/36th Avenue, or the Q104 to 11th Street/34th Avenue.